Buildings Technology

Buildings consume 40% of the nation's primary energy and 74% of its electricity. Thus, more energy efficient buildings are a priority for improving the nation's energy productivity and grid resilience. American companies are competing for global leadership in the manufacture and sale of building components and materials, and their success is vital to the nation's economic health. Public-private partnerships allow Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) to tackle basic research while industry focuses on later stage research and development and implementation.

Research and Development

ORNL's building technologies research focuses on reducing energy use and increasing grid resilience through the following.

Building Equipment

Non-HFC, non-flammable refrigerant that can be dropped into existing supermarket refrigeration hardware and boost efficiency 10%.

New supermarket refrigeration hardware optimized for the CO refrigerant, which uses up to 25% less energy.

System/Building Integration

The Roof Savings Calculator, a web-based tool for evaluating efficiency upgrades at time of roof replacement, which easily integrates with roofing contractor quotation systems for industry-wide adoption.

The Building Science Advisor, a web-based expert system that puts into the hands of builders guidance on how to achieve highly energy- efficient, moisture-durable wall systems in any climate.

Emerging Early Stage Breakthroughs

Progress to date has shown that thermoelectric-based heat pump (HP) clothes dryers can match performance of best-in-market HP dryers at much lower cost.

Although further off, ultrasonic clothes dryers that shake rather than evaporate moisture from fabric could double or triple efficiency. Refrigerators/freezers based on the magnetocaloric efficient can boost efficiency 25% over traditional units.

A transactive controller capable of networking an arbitrary number of building loads to enable grid load flattening without compromising comfort.

Related Organizations

Research Highlights

Cooling homes and small office spaces could become less costly and more efficient with new early stage technology developed by Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Researchers designed a window air conditioning unit that uses propane as the refrigerant, cooling the air with 17 percent higher...

Efforts to bring ORNL’s wireless sensor platform to market are on target and proceeding as planned. In April 2015, ORNL formed a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement with Molex, a premier international electronics manufacturer, to make the low-cost wireless sensors...

The development of the ultrasonic clothes dryer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory is a prime example of collaboration among various divisions at the lab—drawing upon the expertise necessary no matter where a scientist sits to transform a well-researched idea into a great invention....